Can You Count on Cruise Benefits If You Received Your M Life Status via Hyatt?

UPDATE 4/9/14 – A reader wrote today letting me know that RCL has updated the terms and conditions of M Life benefits. If you received your M Life status through a matching program (i.e. Hyatt to M-Life, you are not eligible for any onboard benefits. This has always been the case for the complimentary cruise, but now applies to onboard benefits too. I’m glad some were able to take advantage of this while it worked.

A follow up to this morning’s post about cruise benefits with Royal Caribbean for M Life status holders.

I received a reader email today informing me that they were turned down for M Life benefits on their upcoming Royal Caribbean cruise because they received their M Life status via the new partnership with Hyatt Gold Passport. It seems that the Royal Caribbean reps this reader spoke with knew that the M Life status came via the Hyatt match and not by gambling spend.

While it was pretty clear in the fine print that the annual “free cruise” benefit was dependent on actual gambling spend, it has been speculated on this blog and others that you could get onboard benefits like drink chits, some onboard discounts, etc. via your Hyatt matched M Life status. There was certainly nothing in the fine print that suggested otherwise. This sample size of one may indicate that this is not the case. It also may be a misunderstanding as the partnership is fairly new. One might also have better luck presenting their M Life card to the casino manager on board the ship. If anyone reading this has experimented with getting cruise benefits via your M Life status which was obtained via the partnership with Hyatt Gold Passport, I’d love for you to comment to this post with your experience.

I have reached out to a contact at Royal Caribbean for clarification. I will update this post when I receive further information.

UPDATE: If you’ve read the comments to this post, you can see that readers are reporting success in receiving onboard benefits from Royal Caribbean via their M Life status through the Hyatt match.

Marshall Jackson is an aviation enthusiast and avid cruiser. After 10 years in the airline business, Marshall moved on to a new career that includes plenty of travel and plenty of cruises, and that’s just the way he likes it.

I am new at this and thanks to MJ’s blog, I went from Celebrity Elite status (their highest), through RCL and then M Life, and finally to Hyatt Platinum status. I will be staying at my first Hyatt in Tampa at the end of the month for Frequent Traveler University. First I emailed RCL asking for status, once I had a RCL member #, I emailed M Life, got that status and member #, then emailed Hyatt. The process from Celebrity through Hyatt took about 2 weeks total.

I obtained MLife status via my existing Hyatt status. I called Royal Caribbean’s Casino Department and they had no problem adding the information to my reservation for an upcoming cruise. They told me to see the casino manager once I board to obtain my benefits. We’ll see what happens.